Underlying problems of Food Security

"Food security refers to the availability of food and one's access to it." -en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_security
This quote is the definition of food security, however food security is an
issue that is a result of our economic failure. Economic security is
what the true problem is that is rapidly spreading around this country.
Even in our own homes, right under our noses we are having major issues.

"Queens has seen a whopping 106% spike in the number of emergency meals
provided to hungry residents in the past two years - the second-highest
increase in the city - according to a recent report on hunger." - www.nydailynews.com

Sadly I am not surprised by this. Billions of people go hungry in this
country all the time, so naturally one of the largest populations in
this country must also have a large number of hungry people. The reason
this is going up is obvious, the economy has gone down. We are in a
recession and jobs are becoming less and less easy to find. As a 17
year old pregnant female, in a household with one 18 year old male, we
have been struggling very much with food, rent, utilities, ect. We have
had to resort to government programs due to my inability to find a job
in this economy. I have spent months searching every day for a job, and
still nothing. He has one job which pays very little, and this is
common all through out New York. This year they also canceled section 8
which is a housing program, so now people pay all their money to rent
or live on the cold streets. I know a lot of people in the same or
similar situations. During my summer I spent time at Streetworks, which
is a safe place for teens or young adults to go for food, sleep, health
services, counseling, laundry, ect. They fed over 50 people every day.
Most of those people were teenagers, a lot even younger then me. I
think that the real issue we should focus on is poverty. Poverty is the
cause of the food problems. Poverty is what causes people to need help
for food, and causes people to not be able to donate to food services.
If we fix the economic issues and poverty by creating more jobs,
perhaps food service jobs to increase the natural food supply of new
york, people would be better off.

However if you think our country is doing bad, you should take a look at our entire world. This map really shows how much our globe is struggling. Though, Africa has
bigger food security issues then any other continent in the world. It
is depressing that single place can have that many people hungry. http://www.fao.org/economic/ess/food-security-statistics/fao-hunger...

This map stirred my interest and as I was reading about the hunger problems
in Africa, I wondered if we had food security issues in America too.
Now I know we do, but not as bad. I found this article very interesting
because it was talking about so much struggle for this old woman, the
grandmother of Sithembile Ndema. This little girl's grandmother
worked hard her wh*** life, suffering and struggling to survive, even
as the girl was older she still worked hard on it. This is very sad
that while we take food for granted, people like this are working so
hard for their life, just to survive.
http://english.aljazeera.net/focus/2010/02/201029113234906173.html

Knowing all of this information and seeing for your self all the starving
people on the streets, I question why we have not done more. Yes,
providing food is a start but just giving away free food to people does
not help them, and it does not fix the problem. This is a temporary
fix, what needs to be fixed is our government's economy. We need to fix
the economy of these countries, of this world. We need people to have
more work oppurtunities, more chances to make money to buy their own
food, more options to make their own food. We need more then just a
quick fix, we need a solution.